Jason Momoa relishes opportunity to play Aquaman

Nonetheless, he couldn’t help himself one day on the London set of “Justice League,” a day when Momoa’s wife, actress Lisa Bonet, and their two young children happened to be visiting.

“There I was, standing on the Batmobile, which was moving,” recalled Momoa, 38, who plays Aquaman in the new superhero extravaganza.

“I was surfing the thing with Ben Affleck driving. My kids were there watching me. I stood on that iconic car and, before cameras rolled, yelled, ‘Daddy’s got to go to work!”’

The moment was an indulgent one for an actor who, these days, doesn’t have time for many of them.

Best-known for “Stargate: Atlantis” (2004-09) and as Khal Drogo in “Game of Thrones” (2011-12), Momoa is in the superhero business, with “Justice League” set to open on Friday, and an Aquaman solo feature

scheduled for release next year.

This is not the Aquaman comic-book fans might remember, an Apollonian blond in an orange shirt and green tights. This version has a mane of dirty-blond hair that frames a meaty, well-lived-in face and a scar that slashes his right eyebrow diagonally down the middle.

Not that Momoa couldn’t have rocked the Aquaman Classic look, he hastened to add.

“I want you to know that I look fantastic in green tights,” said the actor, who first played Aquaman in a cameo in “Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice” (2016).

In the new film, with Superman apparently having been killed, Batman (Ben Affleck) sets out to recruit a new team of heroes to step into the Kryptonian’s shoes, including Aquaman, Wonder Woman (Gal Gadot), the Flash (Ezra Miller) and Cyborg (Ray Fisher).

The release is one of the biggest of 2017, and Momoa is at the center of it all.

“Life gets a bit crazier each day,” Momoa said by phone during an interview. "But I try to stay away from all that social-media stuff. I don’t read any of it. It’s just all truth, peace and Zen for me.”

Momoa, who was raised in Norwalk, Iowa, grew up loving comic books and has always wanted to play a superhero on the big screen. He was thrilled when “Justice League” director Zack Snyder brought him in, several years ago, to audition — for Batman.

That role went to Affleck, but Snyder was intrigued by Momoa and kept him in the picture.

“One day I was in Mr. Snyder’s office,” Momoa recalled, “and all of a sudden he said, ‘Jason, I want you play something for me.’ He said,'Aquaman.' My first words were, ‘Pardon me?’

“It was one of the biggest shocks of my life.”

He quickly adjusted to the idea, though.

"What I love about Aquaman is that he’s not really accepted at first on the land or in the sea, which is why he lives in the tides," Momoa said. "He’s hurt when we meet him, and sensitive because he feels like he’s misunderstood. He covers up those feelings at first.

"As an actor, I love that there is so much there,” he continued. "He’s like a big onion where we slowly need to peel away the layers, only to find that inside there is this fierce hero who is really a teddy bear."

Not all of the Justice Leaguers play well with others, but this one does.

“I think Aquaman feels safer when he’s together with the team,” Momoa said. “He joins the Justice League and knows that it’s the greatest thing that ever happened to him. All of a sudden he’s loved, wanted and feels part of something, which is what I think a lot of the fans and people in general long for these days.

“Everyone just wants to be part of something.”

After his birth in Honolulu, Momoa was raised in Iowa by his mother, who took him to movies and gave him a keen appreciation of the arts.

“I loved going to the multiplex,” he said, “but I never thought I’d become an actor.”

After high school, he moved to Hawaii to study marine biology.

“I was folding T-shirts in a surf shop when I heard a call went out that actors were needed for the series ‘Baywatch,”’ he said.

Momoa landed the role of Jason Ioane, and played the part from 1999 to 2001.

“It really fell into my lap,” he said. “Then I studied acting to be taken seriously. The whole point of being an actor is studying life. I found out that I could do so many things as an actor because I could be anyone, live anywhere and go anyplace.”

When “Baywatch” wrapped in 2001, Momoa headed for Los Angeles to audition. His first mainland role was in the short-lived “North Shore” (2004), but he fared better when he was cast as the fugitive Ronon Dex on “Stargate: Atlantis,” a gig that lasted for five years.

He tapped into another phenomenon in 2011, when he was cast as the ruthless Khal Drogo on HBO’s “Game of Thrones.”

"I actually thought they were going to go with another actor," he said. "A voice inside still said, ‘No one is going to take this from me. This is the biggest bad-ass role, and it’s mine.’ Aside from my wife, the other thing I had to have was this role."

As with many “Game of Thrones” stars, however, his time on the show was limited.

“When I read that I was going to die,” Momoa recalled, “I started screaming, ‘No! No way!' I got in the car and actually drove to Barnes & Noble to check out the books and how I would die. I was in the bookstore and started screaming ‘Nooooooo!’ again. It was so brutal.

"Then I had to stop screaming and say, 'That’s awesome.'"

Momoa has his own production company and, after directing a couple of shorts, directed the thriller “Road to Paloma” (2014).

“As an actor, my look limits me to certain things,” he explained, “but there are different stories I want to tell. Being on all these sets has been my film school. I’m always watching, always talking to directors. On every set, I was always watching — always.